Box folder sync broken

Hi Paul, 

Welcome to Box Community and happy to assist!

As much as we wanted to address this issue with you. Your Enterprise account has a designated team that works closely with Box Premier Services.

At this rate, please get in touch with your internal helpdesk team for immediate assistance.

Thanks for posting!

Thanks for coming back to me so quickly, Rona. I was not aware of that support path, but I'll follow-up with them asap. Much appreciated!

Hello 396262190913 - stumbled upon your post while searching online. Exact same problem here (including attempted remedies). 

Did you end up finding a solution?

Hi Ross (sorry I don't now if the @ thing works here). I unfortunately never reached the resolution I was looking for. Even the symlink/junction solution wasn't ideal (mostly because the syncing would slow down any development work with the github folder trying to keep up-to-date every time I ran a build). In the end I would either manually switch to the Box folder if needed for editing shared files, or set-up a Windows Task Scheduler job to sync any local folders to the Box folder, purely as a simple backup for the more local files, e.g. using a batch file:

@echo off
set source="C:\Users\xxx\Documents"
set dest="C:\Users\xxx\Box\My Box Drive\Documents"
robocopy /mir %source% %dest% /s /e /z

I don't think many folks are trying to do what we were trying here, otherwise there would be more noise about it. I don't understand why, because many other sync services do exactly this without any problems it seems.

Good luck though - I hope a solution comes along, because I only found out a couple of months ago after my computer died that the backup was actually working! :)

Cheers, Paul

Thanks for your reply, 396262190913! Shame there's no "fix" per say; only workarounds, it seems. Either way - appreciated. Some other people may find the sync workaround useful, too. 

In my case, no performance issues, just bizarreness of library paths being overwritten (as in your original post). I ended up using a PowerShell script to correct my access each time I log on via Task Scheduler.

Will leave this example code here in case someone else also stumbles upon this thread, needs this workaround, and finds it useful.

Cheers,

Ross

# PowerShell script to set custom folder locations and delete old_Box folders

# Define the custom folder locations using full paths
# !! Make sure to update these file locations with your real location !!
# !! For application compatibility reasons, better not to use environment variables here !!
$folders = @{
    "Personal"    = "C:\Users\username\Box\Documents"
    "Downloads"   = "C:\Users\username\Box\Downloads"
    "My Pictures" = "C:\Users\username\Box\Pictures"
    "My Video"    = "C:\Users\username\Box\Videos"
    "My Music"    = "C:\Users\username\Box\Music"
}

# Log file path (feel free to update this to something else)
$logFile = "C:\Scripts\SetCustomFoldersAndCleanOldBox.log"

# Function to log messages
function Log-Message {
    param (
        [string]$message
    )
    $timestamp = Get-Date -Format "yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss"
    Add-Content -Path $logFile -Value "$timestamp - $message"
}

# Start logging
Log-Message "Script started."

# Set the custom folder locations in User Shell Folders
foreach ($folder in $folders.GetEnumerator()) {
    try {
        $keyPath = "HKCU:\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\User Shell Folders"
        Set-ItemProperty -Path $keyPath -Name $folder.Key -Value $folder.Value
        Log-Message "Set $($folder.Key) to $($folder.Value) in User Shell Folders."
    } catch {
        Log-Message "Error setting $($folder.Key) in User Shell Folders: $_"
    }
}

# Set the custom folder locations in Shell Folders
foreach ($folder in $folders.GetEnumerator()) {
    try {
        $keyPath = "HKCU:\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Folders"
        Set-ItemProperty -Path $keyPath -Name $folder.Key -Value $folder.Value
        Log-Message "Set $($folder.Key) to $($folder.Value) in Shell Folders."
    } catch {
        Log-Message "Error setting $($folder.Key) in Shell Folders: $_"
    }
}

# Update GUID keys for special folders
# !! Make sure to update these file locations with your real location !!
# !! For application compatibility reasons, please DO use environment variables here, not full path !!
$guidFolders = @{
    "{F42EE2D3-909F-4907-8871-4C22FC0BF756}" = "%USERPROFILE%\CustomDocuments"  # Documents
    "{374DE290-123F-4565-9164-39C4925E467B}" = "%USERPROFILE%\CustomDownloads"  # Downloads (legacy)
    "{7D83EE9B-2244-4E70-B1F5-5393042AF1E4}" = "%USERPROFILE%\CustomDownloads"  # Downloads (modern)
    "{0DDD015D-B06C-45D5-8C4C-F59713854639}" = "%USERPROFILE%\CustomPictures"   # Pictures
    "{A0C69A99-21C8-4671-8703-7934162FCF1D}" = "%USERPROFILE%\CustomMusic"      # Music
    "{18989B1D-99B5-455B-841C-AB7C74E4DDFC}" = "%USERPROFILE%\CustomVideos"     # Videos (common)
    "{35286A68-3C57-41A1-BBB1-0EAE73D76C95}" = "%USERPROFILE%\CustomVideos"     # Videos (additional)
}

foreach ($guidFolder in $guidFolders.GetEnumerator()) {
    try {
        $keyPath = "HKCU:\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\User Shell Folders"
        Set-ItemProperty -Path $keyPath -Name $guidFolder.Key -Value $guidFolder.Value
        Log-Message "Set $($guidFolder.Key) to $($guidFolder.Value) in User Shell Folders."
    } catch {
        Log-Message "Error setting $($guidFolder.Key) in User Shell Folders: $_"
    }
}

# Define the base directory where old_Box folders might be created
$baseDirectory = "$env:USERPROFILE"

# Delete any folders starting with "old_Box" in the base directory
try {
    Get-ChildItem -Path $baseDirectory -Directory -Filter "old_Box*" | ForEach-Object {
        Remove-Item -Path $_.FullName -Recurse -Force
        Log-Message "Deleted folder: $($_.FullName)."
    }
} catch {
    Log-Message "Error deleting old_Box folders: $_"
}

# Refresh the environment to apply changes
try {
    # Use a more graceful method to refresh Explorer
    $shell = New-Object -ComObject Shell.Application
    $shell.Namespace(0).Self.InvokeVerb("Refresh")
    Log-Message "Refreshed Explorer."
} catch {
    Log-Message "Error refreshing Explorer: $_"
}

# End logging
Log-Message "Script completed."